(California) warns 26,000 prison workers of layoffs

[alp227]

Source: SF Chronicle

(10-21) 18:46 PDT Sacramento -- California's prison agency began sending the first of 26,000 layoff warnings to employees Friday, alerting prison guards, parole agents and other state workers that they may lose their jobs by February.

The warnings by the California Department of Corrections are the result of Gov. Jerry Brown's so-called realignment program that began Oct. 1 and will eventually culminate with thousands of felons serving their sentences in local jails instead of state prisons. Brown crafted the plan as a way to tackle California's prison overcrowding problem, and it's expected to reduce spending on state prisons by $1.4 billion over the next four years.

Prison officials have warned for months that realignment would result in layoffs to state workers, and the corrections department has been in talks with union leaders for months, said Paul Verke, a spokesman for the department.

While many counties are beefing up probation and other law enforcement staff to prepare for the influx of some 58,000 criminal offenders by 2015, the state is planning to shrink its workforce.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/21/BAFJ1LKVEP.DTL

[Cronus Protagonist]

1. Yay!

Screws suck worse than convicts.

[alittlelark]

2. The uber corrupt CA prison guard union is one to bust up.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704132204576285471510530398.html

California Prison Academy: Better Than a Harvard Degree

The job might not sound glamorous, but a brochure from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations boasts that it "has been called 'the greatest entry-level job in California'?and for good reason. Our officers earn a great salary, and a retirement package you just can't find in private industry. We even pay you to attend our academy." That's right?instead of paying more than $200,000 to attend Harvard, you could earn $3,050 a month at cadet academy.

It gets better.

Training only takes four months, and upon graduating you can look forward to a job with great health, dental and vision benefits and a starting base salary between $45,288 and $65,364. By comparison, Harvard grads can expect to earn $49,897 fresh out of college and $124,759 after 20 years.

As a California prison guard, you can make six figures in overtime and bonuses alone. While Harvard-educated lawyers and consultants often have to work long hours with little recompense besides Chinese take-out, prison guards receive time-and-a-half whenever they work more than 40 hours a week. One sergeant with a base salary of $81,683 collected $114,334 in overtime and $8,648 in bonuses last year, and he's not even the highest paid.

Sure, Harvard grads working in the private sector get bonuses, too, but only if they're good at what they do. Prison guards receive a $1,560 "fitness" bonus just for getting an annual check-up.


And don't forget about their political contributions....

http://capitalresearch.org/2011/09/the-price-of-prison-guard-unions/

The Price of Prison Guard Unions

The California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA) staunchly defends California’s tough-on-crime policies, including strict sentencing laws and pro-incarceration policies. But CCPOA also defends its special interest: it protects the collective bargaining power, pay and benefits of prison guards. A small union with 30,000 members, it is also one of the state’s most powerful lobby organizations. CCPOA argues for a simple equation: stricter sentencing means more prisoners—and more prison guards. In California the results have been disastrous.

In 2010, The Economist magazine dubbed Don Novey the “most important man in California politics that no one had ever heard of.” A former prison guard, Novey was elected president of the California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA) in 1980 and held office until 2002. During that time California’s prison population exploded and so did the state’s hiring of prison guards.

Novey made his union a political powerhouse. Today, California’s prison guards union dispenses large amounts of money to political candidates, and it makes contributions to ballot initiatives and endorses or opposes policy proposals that will determine the number, salaries, and benefits of prison guards. Most importantly, the union uses its powerful bully pulpit to instruct California voters about crime and punishment, the two issues that determine how many prisons the state builds and how many prison guards the state hires and pays.

In 1980 California’s inmate population was 24,471. Within three years it grew to 34,640. By 1991, the inmate population stood at 97,309. In 1999 it was 165,166. Between 1990 and 2005 the prison population grew by 73 percent, three times faster than the state’s population, reaching a high of 172,000 in 2006.



Jerry Brown Gets It!

[Kaleko]

3. Those are some mind-boggling stats.

Thanks for posting.

[HDPaulG]

4. Jealous 'alittlelark' ?

Please cite your sources aside from a Rupert Murdoch newspaper. Want to make more money then?...Become a Public Sector prison guard. Or better yet, be employed in a craft/trade that has a Union.

Are you sour that your make less?

[alittlelark]

8. Dude, What is your problem?

I support 99% of unions - just not the corrupt ones that lobby for mandatory sentences.

PS - We make more than the highest paid prison guards.

[walerosco]

6. say it aint so

Now I wonder if they are hiring :)

[dotymed]

7. These statistics are terrifying.

We must have freedom and unfortunately people do lose theirs and end up in prison. Personally, I prefer a state prison concept to the corporate for profit system. Most states are moving toward the corporate owned prisons.

Either way, many people are needlessly incarcerated for non-violent "crimes." Many people are also incarcerated for violent crimes that they did not commit. Any organization that seeks to pervert justice by taking away personal freedoms, especially so they can profit, should be illegal.

This is another reason most Americans support OWS. We must remove ALL money from politics. Lobbyists, IMO, should be history. They distort and bribe officials to profit their industry.

Greed and corruption has killed our country. The solution is not a few patches to keep our society hobbling on. We must create a new system. There are other countries whose laws we can incorporate into our new system, but we must have a "people first" mindset.

[SoapBox]

10. Ditto...This is a major scum organization.

Don't get me wrong at all...I am VERY in favor of unions.

BUT, this group is one of those that spoils everything for everyone else. Talk about DIRTY!

They need to be reeled in, totally.

[alp227]

11. also capital research=rw think tank

[droidamus2]

5. My questions are...

Why don't they just release all the non-violent drug offenders from state prison? They could probably make most of the same prison job cuts and not have to foist off the felons on the counties. I like Jerry Brown but this is an old trick in California (and probably other states) where to make the state budget look better they just move the cost to the counties or cities. So yes it will save the state 1.4 billion over 4 years but what is it going to cost the counties (many of which have bad budget problems to begin with) over the same period? Since there will be a great deal of duplicated effort to bolster each counties capabilities of handling this many high risk inmates will there really be a net budgetary plus to this move? I would really like to see the numbers after the 4 year period.

[lunatica]

9. Is this an invitation to privatize prisons?

Great. For profit prisons. Put the prisoners to work for profit to the prison owners. Aah! Capitalism! Ain't it grand?

:sarcasm: